Tuesday July 21, 2020 ~ VICTORIA, BC
by Mary Brooke ~ West Shore Voice News
The BC health care system is fortifying itself and ramping up to full capacity if not beyond, in the wake of suspending surgeries during the initial wave of COVID-19.
Non-urgent surgeries were suspended across BC’s health authorities starting March 16 so that hospitals could be prepared for handling any possible upsurge in COVID cases that would come. “That was a very difficult decision to postpone non-urgent scheduled surgeries,” said BC Health Minister Adrian Dix today.
Compared to other jurisdictions where hospitals were overwhelmed, BC did not have that problem. Sustained capacity in hospitals resulted from a combined effort of being prepared with staffing, PPE and reorganization of space or use of space. But also because British Columbians did their part to flatten the curve by staying home and away from businesses and schools during the height of the COVID spread.
The May 18 to June 25 period:
Today was the Province’s first public update report on the Surgical Renewal Commitment, which covers May 18, 2020 to June 25, 2020. They state in their July 21 news release that progress includes the following:
- 62,744 patients have been contacted to arrange their surgery from May 7 to July 12, 2020.
- 52% of the 17,742 whose surgery was postponed, and who have been called, had their surgeries completed by June 25, 2020.
- 33,723 surgeries have been completed from May 18 to June 25, 2020, representing 91% of last year’s volume.
- Since the ramp-up period ended June 15, 100% or more of 2019 volumes have been completed each week.
- From May 18 to June 25, 2020, urgent surgery volumes exceeded last year’s volumes.
- Significant focus on patients waiting longer than two times their target wait time resulted in these patients making up 19.4% of non-urgent surgeries completed during the time period, compared to 10.5% in 2019.
- 97% of the previous year’s operating hours was achieved during the ramp-up period.
- Summer slowdowns will be reduced by 52%. In previous years, surgical activity has decreased during the summer as a result of planned vacations.
- Surgery durations are back to within 6% of where they were last year.
- $815,000 has been provided to Health Match BC to support the recruitment of additional health-care professionals.
- Since April 1, 2020, 29 new anesthetists have been recruited.
- Recruitment efforts have also resulted in the hiring of 111 perioperative registered nurses, six perioperative licensed practical nurses, 60 post-anesthetic recovery registered nurses and 35 medical device reprocessing technicians.
Keeping COVID under control is key:
Minister Dix was emphatic again today that the continued commitment of British Columbians to physical distancing, socializing in small known groups, and other aspects of COVID-19 pandemic management are essential for all the rest to function well — in both health care and the economy.
COVID pandemic conditions are still with us, possibly for a year or longer until there is an effective treatment or vaccine, Dix reminded media and the public today in his teleconference at noon. “We have to operate with our eyes open,” he said with regard to adhering to what we know works, including physical distancing and maintaining known and small social bubles. “We have the most impact on the ones we love the most.” said Dix, as to decisions people make about socializing and interaction in the community.
COVID-related anxiety:
Dix readily described how coming to terms with the extended restrictions in dealing with COVID-19 in our daily lives, businesses and communities causes people anxiety. “This is the new normal. We’ve got to continue to dig in here.” And in the context of today’s news conference, to “allow people who are suffering to get surgery”.
Backlog of scheduled surgeries:
About 32,400 scheduled surgeries were ‘lost’ during the COVID period to mid-May.
Personnel levels are key to surgical renewal:
The goal is set for renewal of the surgical system. Dix wants to take care of backlog due to COVID postponements and catch up with ambitious goals for even more surgeries in BC health care facilities. That requires maintaining resources — including personnel, and being efficient with that.
Today Minister Dix said that June’s recruitment has resulted in the hiring of 111 perioperative registered nurses, six perioperative licensed practical nurses, 60 post-anesthetic recovery registered nurses and 35 medical device reprocessing technicians. He highlighted the hiring of 29 anaesthetists, as of course an increase in surgical procedures cannot be accomplished without anaesthetics.
Twenty-eight registered nurses have completed peri-operating training and 23 starting their training. Back in April Dix said all of this year’s nursing grads would be offered employment, though it appears not all have accepted. Nurses could now be seen as a high-stress, high-risk profession in a way that was perhaps not evident pre-COVID.
As Michael Marchbank pointed out in today’s news conference (he’s the former president and CEO of Fraser Health Authority, now a consultant to the Ministry of Health for surgical renewal), fulfilling the personnel side of the equation of ramping up the surgical program goals is key.
Marchbank said he was pleasantly surprised that summer scheduling is robust (a lot of health care personnel shifted their summer vacation time to be working now instead of taking holidays) which is a positive indicator of commitment to helping BC hospitals catch up with the additional surgical backlog that was produced by the COVID scenario.
It’s all about people:
The surgical renewal scenario — an ambitious goal that Minister Dix has set for his government and British Columbians – will rely on having enough personnel with the required range of qualifications, and enough hours available from those personnel — even highly motivated — on a sustained basis in order to meet the heightened demand.
Meeting the original pre-COVID goals of increased surgical performance loads and now adding on top of that the demands of catching up for COVID-deferred surgeries will require immense commitment and performance by health care personnel — particularly surgeons, specialized nurses and technicians. How long that overload scenario can be maintained is critical to achieving the dual-recovery goals of increased surgical procedures in BC.